Keeping in mind this is a relatively high-minded guide for dedicated wine enthusiasts, you'd have to say the region passed its first big test.

"As the region's steadily growing ranks of winemakers gain experience, homing in on the best grapes and vineyard sites, the Finger Lakes is quickly becoming an excellent source for quality and value," wrote senior editor James Molesworth at the end of his story on the region in the January-February issue. "It's time for serious wine consumers to take notice."

While the Finger Lakes has been a wine-producing region for well over a century, it's only been in recent decades that it has been producing the type of wines that serious critics care about -- the wines knows as vinifera. These are made from the classic European grapes, with famous names like Pinot Noir, Riesling and Chardonnay.

Molesworth had particularly nice things to say about Heart & Hands winery, on Cayuga Lake near Union Springs. It's had success with Pinot Noir, despite the region's notoriously difficult history with red wines.

Molesworth, who is also Wine Spectator's lead taster for France's Bordeaux, Loire and Rhone regions, as well as South Africa, isn't ready to put the Finger Lakes in that class. But he is optimistic for its future.

James Molesworth, senior editor of Wine Spectator, reviewed the wines of the Finger Lakes in Wine Spectator's current issue.Nancy Lee Molesworth

Want to know more? Molesworth spoke to us last week from his New York City office:

So this is the first major tasting Wine Spectator has done for the Finger Lakes, correct?

It's the first time we've done what we call a tasting report - it's the first official tasting report on the Finger Lakes. We've done a lot of smaller items, but this is the first time its got a feature.

What took so long?

It's a couple of things. For a long time, the wines were not being submitted in the mass they are now, the wineries are getting much more proactive about submitting wines for review. ... I think also probably for a while they wanted to duck it a little bit.

Then, also, as that critical mass of wines has come in, which has been going on for a few years now, you know we get to see to see what the trends are, and obviously quality has improved. So it was time to do. I think things in the Finger Lakes are much different than they were ten years ago.

So it is fair to say you were impressed overall with the quality?

I'm happy to say it's an improving trend line. I try to be conservative in my praise.

I think there is still a long way to go for the Finger Lakes, but the top 10 to 15 wineries are making some pretty good stuff. I still consider it a region very much in its beginning stages.

What's it going to take for the Finger Lakes (to win more critical recognition)? When is it going to be, well not in the class of Burgundy or Bordeaux, but maybe like Oregon or Washington?

When is hard to say. A generation is probably a good barometer. In that time period a group of winemakers, they'll see maybe 20 harvests and then there are people coming behind them who can learn from them. For the most part, the better winemakers in the area, most of them, have ten or maybe 15 years experience at most.

Ten years in the wine business is not a long time. I consider the wine business to be sort of (at a ) geological pace. Twenty to 25 years is really when you kind of know what you're doing.

As for how it's going to get there, it's kind of push-pull: You just have to keep getting serious about quality, which means among other things reducing yields (harvesting fewer grapes) and focusing on serious varietals instead of large yields and less interesting varietals.

Then, from the outside, people are going to have to get over whatever prejudices they have about trying Finger Lakes wine. The markets are going to have to start distributing the wine outside of just New York state or more than just out of the winery door. ...

I can give all the high scores I want, but if the wines aren't sent out of the winery into the marketplace, people aren't going to find them and there's not going to be any interest
building.

A lot of the market right now for the Finger lakes, or the sales let's say, is people touring the area -- tour buses, limos. For that reason, most of the wineries have some, well let's say Hazlitt Red Cat, for example. (That's a sweet wine that is made from native, not vinifera grapes. It's the top seller in the Finger Lakes). They seem reluctant to give up on those because that's what they make money on when the tour buses come. Is that sort of thing holding back the critical recognition?

I definitely think so. I mean, I can't begrudge a winery for having a positive cash flow. It's not an easy business. But the Finger Lakes still does play to the lowest common denominator a lot of the time.

... It's just a mindset that's kind of odd to me. It's a willingness to play down to the customer that wants Red Cat, instead of saying, you know what, we're going to try to pull the customers along here and educate them and bring them up the ladder.

Wine Spectator

Obviously Riesling is the strong thing here (About one third of all the region's vinifera grapes are Riesling). Is it strong enough to build a region around?

Well, Germany's done it. Austria in a way; Alsace in a way. And there's certainly an increased interest among a pretty solid consumer segment for low alcohol, cool climate, aromatic whites (like Riesling). And Riesling is pretty popular with a lot of sommeliers and wine directors and other people in the industry. So yeah, I think they can build a region around that. I mean we're taking only about 100 or 120 wineries in the Finger Lakes, so it's not like we're talking abut a massive region, in which case maybe that would be a stretch.

But I would also say that while Riesling is clearly the lead varietal now, it isn't a lock to be the lead varietal down the road. We still don't know about Gewurtztraminer; we still don't know about Pinot Gris (two white grapes that Finger Lakes winemakers are working with). We don't know about a lot of stuff.

... But I think it (Riesling) is going to be the signature varietal for the region for the serious producers, yeah.

If something else is going to overtake it, it would probably also be a cool-climate aromatic white, then?

Probably Germanic whites, maybe Pinot Noir. But reds are going to be a tough one.

There's been a big push to identify what red might do well here. (Red Tail Ridge on Seneca Lake, for example, has experimented with reds like Lemberger and Teroldego.) What do you think is the future here for reds?

I think Pinot Noir, (grown) on limestone could be interesting. (As Heart & Hands is doing). But that is a grape that is very finicky about yields and once you start getting into the higher yields it just really doesn't work. So that's going to be the Achilles heel, bringing the yields down and getting something into the bottle and then is probably going to end up retailing for $30 or more . Are producers willing to go to that length?

And then the other gapes like Lemberger and Teroldego, I definitely think there's something there. Red Tail Ridge is already getting some really solid wines there and, you know, that comes from proper site selection and vineyard management, as well as smart winemaking. But obviously you can't plant every grape and make something good with it.

The fact that they're getting some good success right away with those, I think, is a good sign for the region

In your article, you mention a trend toward Finger Lakes wines made from grapes in a single vineyard, as opposed to sourcing from several vineyards.

Yes, definitely. The pros are if winemakers can home in on a site where you get really good quality fruit and its expressing something interesting about the site ... then I think its worthwhile. To just make single vineyard wines because they've got catchy names or you can put out three, five, or six bottlings and say you're making a lot of wine ... if it's just a marketing angle, its not going to work. So they've got to focus on the quality here.

But I definitely think the single-vineyard wines from the top producers are the most interesting wines being made right now.